New York City Police Commissioner
Raymond Kelly said there is no evidence to suggest the Pakistani
Taliban movement was behind a bombing attempt in Times Square
yesterday.

The group claimed responsibility for the attempt in a video
posted on YouTube. A tie to Viacom Inc.’s “South Park”
cartoon won’t be ruled out, Kelly said. The creators of the TV
program are a possible target, CNN reported, after an episode
showed images of the Prophet Muhammad in a bear costume.

“It was somebody who brought this to the location to send a
message to terrorize people in the area,” Kelly said at a press
conference this afternoon. “A terrorist act doesn’t
necessarily have to be conducted by an organization.”

New York police disarmed a bomb in a Nissan Pathfinder
sport-utility vehicle parked last night in Times Square,
averting an attack in the heart of the city’s theater district.
The car contained three propane tanks, consumer-grade fireworks,
two filled 5-gallon gasoline containers and two clocks.

Kelly said police have video footage of a white male in his
40s walking down an alley close to where the vehicle was parked.
The man in the tape was filmed taking a dark-colored shirt off,
revealing a red one underneath, Kelly said.

Footage

Police are going to release the tape to try to get more
information, Kelly said.

Tape from 30 of 83 video-surveillance cameras in the area
have been reviewed and police are looking for more footage,
Kelly said. They are traveling to Pennsylvania to view video
taken in New York of a possible suspect.

The Pakistani Taliban movement claimed responsibility for
yesterday’s attempt, according to SITE Intelligence Group, a
Bethesda, Maryland-based company that monitors use of the
Internet by Islamic militant groups.

In a video posted on YouTube, Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan
spokesman Qari Hussein Mehsud said the attack was vengeance for
the killings of two al-Qaeda leaders in Iraq, SITE said. Mehsud
and other Pakistani Taliban spokesmen couldn’t immediately be
reached by phone for confirmation of the report. Their movement
has focused its attacks on Pakistani military and government
targets, and has not previously conducted a confirmed attack in
the United States.

Vendor Alerts Police

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, speaking at an news
conference hours after the incident, said that a T-shirt vendor
alerted a police officer to a suspicious SUV parked near the
Minskoff Theater, where “The Lion King” musical is playing.

Bloomberg also said the vehicle identification number had
been removed from the SUV, and police discovered its license
plates, registered in the state of Connecticut, had been removed
from a different vehicle, a truck discarded by its former owner
at a Connecticut junkyard.

Bomb squad technicians used a robotic dismantler to take
apart a crude explosive device that included the propane tanks,
Deputy Police Commissioner Paul Browne, the department’s chief
spokesman, said in a telephone interview earlier.

The vehicle was placed in an NYPD forensic garage in
Queens this morning, Commissioner Kelly said.

Ensure Safety

The New York police and fire departments “responded
swiftly and aggressively to a dangerous situation,” President
Barack Obama said today.

“My national security team has been taking every step
necessary” to ensure Americans’ safety, said Obama, who spoke
with Bloomberg earlier.

New York City in 2009 was the top U.S. tourist destination
with 45.25 million visitors, surpassing Orlando, Florida, home
of Walt Disney Co.’s Walt Disney World and Las Vegas. New York
City visitors spent about $28 billion last year, injecting about
$45 billion of total purchases into the economy, NYC & Co. said.

Bloomberg took office in January 2002, a few months after
the coordinated Sept. 11, 2001, attacks by the al-Qaeda terror
group that killed almost 3,000 people, most at the World Trade
Center in New York and the Pentagon just outside of Washington.

The mayor is founder and majority owner of Bloomberg News
parent Bloomberg LP.